Poker Strategy - Single-Table NL Tournaments

Single-table
no-limit hold'em tournaments (also known as "sit and go"
tournaments) are incredibly popular. By far, the most popular
place on the internet for single-table tournaments is
Empire Poker.
They hold tournaments with buy-ins ranging from $5 to $200.
Single-table tournaments are also often held in brick-and-mortar
casinos. However, B&M single-table tournaments are usually
satellites to multi-table tournaments and are most frequently
played winner-take-all.

The strategy for this
article focuses on tournaments that are ten-handed, with the
payout structure of 50% to first place, 30% to second place, and
20% to third place. If you are playing in a winner-take-all
single table tournament, you will probably need to play a much
more aggressive strategy than the one advocated in this article.

At the first level, you
should aim to see as many flops as cheaply as possible.
Obviously, raise when you hold very strong hands like
Q Q,
but limp to see a lot of flops if you can with hands like
9 8.

For the lower buy-in
tournaments, there are a lot of bad players that will quickly
lose their money in the first few rounds. If you happen to hit a
really strong hand, there is a decent chance someone will pay
you off with a lot of their stack.

At the second level, you
should still attempt to see quite a few flops. However, if the
pot is frequently raised, you will need to play tighter preflop.

Once the blinds are
50-100, you need to start focusing more on stealing the blinds.
Except for a few circumstances, you should almost always raise
if you are the first to enter the pot (meaning no one else has
called or raised the big blind yet). A typical raise is 3 to 4
big blinds (300 to 400 when the blinds are 50-100).

Some examples of times
when it may just be better to limp in is if you hold AA in early
position and want to induce someone else to raise after you.
Then, you can reraise him all-in when the action gets back to
you.

When the blinds are
50-100 and higher, the "gap" concept comes into play more. There
is a "gap" between the hand strength that is needed to open a
pot and the hand strength that is needed to call someone who
raised. This implies that blind stealing is effective.

You should be more
willing to enter a pot if no one else has already called or
raised the pot. If someone has already entered the pot, they
likely have a strong hand. Thus, stealing the blinds is much
more difficult, and it is much more likely your hand will be
challenged. So when someone else has already entered the pot,
you need to be more selective with your hands.

Further into the
tournament, when the blinds are 150-300 and higher, almost all
the action will occur preflop. At this point in time, you will
generally be in one of three situations:

You're shortstacked. You
can only afford about 5 big blinds at the level, and those big
blinds are just gonna get more expensive. The worst thing to do
is to blind yourself to death. Stealing the blinds means a lot
to you at this point, and the last thing you want to do is see a
flop for half your stack and fold. Consider going all-in with
Ace and a high card, or any pair preflop (provided another
person hasn't bet for a lot already). In late position, you
should consider just going all-in with two cards of ten or
higher if no one has entered the pot. You want enough chips to
survive and get into at least third place.

You have a medium-sized
stack. Try to accumulate chips slowly, avoid a big confrontation
unless you clearly have the best of it. Your goal should still
be to win the tournament, not to just place. After all, winning
one STT is better than placing third in two single-table
tournaments.

You have a large stack.
If you are clearly one of the chip leaders at the table, you
should use your power to bully other players around. For
example, if you have 4,000 chips and other players have around
1,000 chips with blinds of 100-200, you should very aggressively
steal blinds. Don't be stupid, but be aggressive. Opponents will
be scared to call you because they will be trying to sneak into
the money. Solidify your position and aim to win the tournament.

If you intend to play a
lot of SNG's, you should definitely keep track of your
statistics. This way you can compare how well you are doing at
different buy-ins. You can keep track of your poker statistics
for free at
PokerCharts.com.

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